Bangkok bomb hunt narrows, police flag new suspects

BANGKOK: The hunt for those behind the Bangkok shrine blast narrowed on Monday as police revealed they have two new suspects after more bomb-making paraphernalia was found in a suburban apartment.
But two weeks after the unprecedented attack brought carnage to the city’s commercial centre, the motive for it remains shrouded in mystery.
The bomb that hit the Erawan shrine on August 17 was Thailand’s worst single mass-casualty attack. It killed 20 people, the majority of them ethnic Chinese tourists from across Asia.
Suspicion has alternated between Thailand’s bitter political rivals, organised criminal gangs, Islamist militants, rebels in the kingdom’s strife-torn south and sympathisers of refugees from China’s Uighur minority.
Thailand recently deported more than 100 Uighurs to China, enraging supporters of the minority who allege they face torture and repression back home.
Police are now seeking a Thai woman and an unidentified man after bomb-making materials were discovered over the weekend in an apartment in the suburb of Minburi.
Investigators believe it was used as a hideout by the network that carried out the attack.
“We found fertiliser bags, watches, radio controls — parts to make bombs and electric charges,” said national police spokesman Prawut Thavornsiri. “We are confident they are the same group.”
Police had detained an unidentified foreign man on Saturday morning at another flat nearby, where detonators, industrial pipes and ball bearings were found.
In a televised broadcast Prawut displayed a photograph of the wanted Thai woman taken from an official identity card, showing her wearing a black hijab. He named her as 26-year-old Wanna Suansan — also known by the Muslim name Misaloh — the first time a suspect in the bombing probe has been identified. A sketch of an unidentified man with a moustache was also broadcast.